A website for a farm stay or glamping — without commission

A farm stay, a glamping site or a countryside apartment lives on guests who today mostly arrive through portals such as Booking.com and Airbnb. Those bring bookings, but they take 15 to 18 per cent of every night — and they keep the guest for themselves. By the end of the year that can add up to a whole dead season paid to the middleman.

Your own website with direct booking does not mean walking away from the portals. It means that a guest who already knows you books with you directly next time — without commission.

Why a guest comes to your site at all

On Booking you are one of a hundred similar listings, pressed into the same template. On your own site you can be what you actually are: morning mist over the valley, a home-made breakfast, a sauna with a view, silence. Atmosphere is exactly what a portal cannot sell on your behalf.

So a site for a farm stay or a glamping site opens with one large photograph and one sentence, not with a rate table. The guest has to feel the place first; only then do the dates matter.

Direct booking: three routes

You do not have to build an entire booking system to be rid of the commission. Depending on your size, we take one of three routes:

1. A one-step enquiry — the guest picks the dates and the number of people, you confirm. The simplest option and often enough for smaller hosts.
2. A booking system through an interface — availability and prices come from the tool you already use (the channel manager), while the guest books and pays on your site.
3. Your own calendar with a deposit — for those who want full control and no monthly subscriptions.

One thing matters in all three: staying in step with the portals, so you never sell a date that has already gone through Booking. We set that up from the start.

Several languages is not translation, it is markets

The countryside here is filled by guests from Germany, Austria, Italy and the Netherlands. That means more than translated text: it means separate pages for every language and the correct tags, so that Google shows the German version to a German guest. Without them all the languages compete in the same search results and none of them wins.

A portal brings you a guest once. Your own site is what makes them come back — and bring friends, without commission.

What increases direct bookings

• Gift vouchers — a weekend for two that can be bought and printed immediately. December can turn out to be your strongest month.
• Experience packages — a night with dinner, the sauna or a guided walk; the portal does not have that.
• The story of the farm — who you are, where the food comes from, why this place. Countryside guests are buying authenticity.
• Reviews and guest photographs — real faces, not anonymous stars.

How long it takes and what it costs

A presentation site with a gallery, the accommodation and an enquiry form is usually finished in three to four weeks. Adding a real booking system or several languages lengthens the project, but for a host with steady occupancy it pays back quickly — a handful of direct bookings a year already covers the difference.

If you run a farm stay, glamping site or apartments

Write to us with how many units you let and through which portals. That alone shows whether a simple enquiry form is enough for you or a real booking system is worth it — and how much commission you could be keeping for yourself.